European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - December 30, 1988, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Friday december 30, 1988 the stars and stripes Page 23 commentary Money dominates Ueberroth s game n Thomas bos Well for Christmas baseball fans received a Little gift in their sanitary Hose from Peter Ueberroth. The 1990 season. He raved in. With his hardball network to Deal with chs. And with the Cable to Deal that hell work out soon. As recently As a month ago the 90 season looked As if it might be ruined nyc 81, or maybe even extinguished by the worst Tabor War Ever in sports. Players were demanding strike clauses in contract while owners negotiated the opposite lockout clauses. Stars were deferring Money to other seasons or else lining up contracts to play in Japan. Now there s no reason on Earth Why players will be foolish enough to go on strike or the owners will be villainous enough to lock them out. You see the game s owners gel something in their stockings from the commissioner Loo. A billion Bucks from lbs. Plus a half billion or More from Cable to. Not to mention super station to revenues. More Cash than even they can figure out How to squander. Al least for a Tew years anyway. As for the players they get their wish too. Abright shiny free Market like the one they had for a decade unfettered capitalism reappeared at the Winter meetings in Atlanta with crazy bidding and it s Noi going away. Ueberroth was a key player in taking thai open Market away from players for a couple of Collu Sive years. He convinced owners they were about to lose Moni y if they did t Wise up and act like Sensi ble monopolists. Now he s helped give a Square Deal Back to the players by making the owners so Rich once More thai they can t Wail to compete naturally those with a vested interest in the Strat egy of Long term labor negotiations Don Chr of the Union and Barry Rona of management still think a crisis exists. According to sources both As sume there la be a Spring training lockout in 1990 by owners As a test of Union Solidarity. However those with millions to lose Aren t going to shoot themselves in the fool just for the experience. Every owner will have at least $5 million a year More in his budget thanks to the to deals and Lloyd s of London in t going to give he Bosses 60days of strike insurance this Lime. Conversely hundreds of mediocre players like Tom Neiden fuck and left Leonard who just got two year contracts for s1.75 million from the poorest franchise i baseball Seattle Are Likely to be flexible. Sabers will to rattled out they la be sheathed. Thanks to Cash. And pressure from millions of us who know there s enough wealth to make pm All Rich. When you re thin economically that causes labor problems said Ueberroth in a Telephone  tuesday. But when both sides come to the table Wilh a lot at risk Hal augers  Ueberroth uses Money As his sword. So renewed free agent bidding and big to buc Sadd up to Good labor news i think that s a tenable conclusion for ministers in search of homilies Money May Bethe Root of evil. But to Ueberroth who is business to the Core Money is the solution to most  your product Well enough show enough profit and you can revive he olympic movement. Fin Rich new ways to Market baseball to television and you can Wash away the game s labor problems in a Yule lid flood of Cash. Ueberroth s dazzling disregard for moral subtleties his almost Complete disinterest in keeping his hands clean has worked again. His specially is real solutions to real problems. His method almost invariably is to use Money As both the Carrol and the stick to defeat the annoying foibles of human nature. This is the Man whose first solution for baseball s drug problem was to pay players o slay clean put onus clauses in contacts for players who would sub Mit to drug testing. This also is the fellow who Laid the groundwork for two years of legally documented collusion he called the tune even if be did t actually Call the  s late set Success is another ambiguous but perhaps ruling seasonal message for the age of he leveraged buyout. Would Bowie Kuhn or a. Bar licit Giamatti another Ivy league Type have had the. Gall or the business imagination to pull off such a would Kuhn have Felt Hamstrung by loyalty 1o base Ball s longtime friends at arc and to a greater dog rec. Al Abc no major sport owes More to anybody than baseball owes to Abc lbs has t telecast a big league game since 1964. What special consideration did Abc gel for its 40-year marriage with baseball we weren t tied into going with the highest bidder. Loyalty matters said Ueberroth. Abc was playing on something a Little better than a level  still the Field was t tilled enough to save the pea cock. Can anybody imagine Kuhn killing game of the week that s what Ueberroth did by cutting the net work package from 3d to 12 regular season games. Thai Means he has a better package with which to tempt the Cable bidders. However on lbs we re icel with the game of every other week sometimes. What about baseball s car lard connection Wilh the folks in Abilene and fort Wayne in t that part of what makes baseball the National pastime and in t network to the umbilical Cord of that connection Kuhn thought so. And pushed for not against the game of the  Ueberroth sees no urgent problem. The Large majority of americans still can pull in lots of free local broadcasts. There have been More free games on the air every year says Ueberroth of his tenure. Some Day local games might shrivel As Cable eats the Market. But not now. And Ueberroth thinks now we want to present our season the Best Way Possi ble said Ueberroth who thinks that Means Cable games on sunday tuesday wednesday and Friday  pays for baseball s new riches the networks to be sure. It is ironic that the same auction mentality that spawned wild free agent spending now exists among the three new management groups at the major networks. Let s say they be become Muchmore competitive says Ueberroth. Eventually some of the network s costs gel passed along. Mont directly the Well to do half of the population that now has Cable to Wilt pay to see its Choice games. Also the less affluent who Don t have Cable will pay in the sense that there will be in less network , As with much that Ueberroth has accomplished in sports his results arc stunningly effective while his methods seem tolerable considering the benefits to important institutions such As the olym pics and baseball. We arc left wondering what prob lems this resourceful loner will tackle next and what novel and contrary solutions he will attempt. With Money As his sword. Graf arrives in Australia to Start defense of slam. Steffi crat is not trying to do something special. Perth Australia a Stelti Graf is tuning up for the defense of her Tennis grand slam. Nothing special she says. No pressure because i have Don and achieved everything i  Graf arrived Here wednesday and practice for about 40 minutes. The firs of the Tennis grand slam tournaments the australian open is Jan. 16 in Mel. Bourne. Then comes the French open Wimbledon and the . Open the other three thai Graf won last year to claim the first grand slam in 18 years. Maybe i could try and do the same again but i be done it and there is nothing else i could want she said. I am not trying to do something special. I always try 10 do my besi. Graf who has not played since her shocking loss to Pam Shriver in  of the season ending Virginia slims championship in new York a month ago is Here for the inaugural hopman cup learns went.". Named after former australian Davis cup Captain. Harry hopman the Challenge event features eight nations each made up of a male and female player in Knock out style Competition run along similar lines to the Davis and federation cup  Graf 19, is teaming with Patrick Kuhnen for West Germany in the Competition which runs through Sun she is using the hopman cup to help Tine tune her game for the australian open the hopman cup an australian open will be played on the same synthetic hard court surface rebound Ace rebound Ace is not one of the usual surfaces Solo get the same conditions is perfect Graf said. The West German said she would follow the same routine she adopted last january and bypass Lead up tournaments in favor of two weeks of intense practice in Melbourne. The formula worked perfectly last january As Graf beat Chris Evert in the final to capture the first leg of her grand slam. Graf 19, looked Strong and fit As she practice first with France s Pas Cate Paradis and Ihen her coach Pavel Swozil. After a 28-hour flight i just wanted to do some thing. It s Good sometimes getting a Start straight away the West German said. Graf said she was now More relaxed about her game and was concentrating on improving her technique. I want to learn to  in More and to get More variety on my strokes she said. Graf plays her first match Friday against Paradis